Simple, low-effort, and effective, the bokashi composting method is a unique way of disposing of food and kitchen waste in an environmentally friendly way.
Bokashi is quite different from other types of composting, so without further ado, let’s learn all about what it takes for successful bokashi composting.
What Is Bokashi Composting?
“Bokashi” is a Japanese word meaning “fermented organic matter.” Developed in the 1980s by a professor at the University of Ryukyus in Okinawa, Japan, Dr. Teuro Higa, bokashi composting is the process of breaking down organic materials in bokashi buckets, or bokashi bins. Unlike traditional composting methods, the bokashi process includes an extra ingredient, bokashi bran, also called incoculant or inoculated bran. A mixture that encourages the fermentation process, inoculant consists of lactic acid bacteria, yeast, photosynthetic bacteria, molasses, water, and bran.
To create bokashi compost, you add the bokashi inoculant, your food waste, such as meat and dairy products, fruit and vegetable scraps, and similar organic materials to a bokashi composting bin, also known as a bokashi system. When you add your materials to your bokashi bucket, be sure to press down to get all the air out. Air is the enemy of fermentation.
The anaerobic fermentation process involves adding converse carbohydrates—better known as sugar—to organic materials in an oxygen-free environment. The microorganisms produce nutraceuticals or bacteriocins, and break down the materials without oxygen. Fermentation means you won’t have to mix these materials at all. When the process is complete, you’ll have a brown liquid known as “bokashi tea” or “bokashi juice,” which you can then add to your houseplants and garden soil.
Benefits of Bokashi Composting
Bokashi makes it easy to compost in an apartment, which you can’t do with all composting methods. Also not appropriate for other methods is adding meat, dairy, bread, and rice because they can spread pathogens and toxins and attract pests, but you can add all these items when you compost with bokashi because the fermentation process kills pathogens.
All the benefits of composting apply to bokashi.
The biggest benefit of composting is keeping food out of landfills. As organic materials decompose in landfills, they release biogas, a dangerous mix of carbon dioxide and methane, into the environment, worsening climate change. Composting reduces the amount of food waste thrown out by as much as 30% and eliminates up to 11% of biogas.
Another benefit of bokashi is water conservation. When added to houseplant and garden soil, bokashi increases water retention, reducing the amount of water your garden will need.
Compost also adds essential nutrients to soil and protects plants more effectively and safely than chemical pesticides and fertilizers, making it a more environmentally friendly option.
Here are the most common nutrients present in bokashi compost:
- Phosphorus
- Potassium
- Nitrogen
- Manganese
- Sulfur
- Zinc
- Carbon
- Iodine
- Magnezium
- Iron
- Calcium
- Copper
- Boron
The specific amounts of these nutrients will vary depending on what organic materials you add pre-compost, but any combination is likely to benefit your plants. Adding them to your garden beds will encourage your flowers to bloom longer and look healthier. Plant yields in your garden won’t need as much watering or maintenance. Your garden will look lusher and fuller without much effort. Houseplants, potted plants, shrub plants, and vegetable gardens all benefit in the same way.
Bokashi tea
Another unique benefit of bokashi is the creation of a nutrient-rich tea called “bokashi tea.” This compost tea can be added directly to soil in the same way the dry material can, but it has a unique microbial makeup that improves the health and vitality of any soil and plants it’s added to.
Plant roots thrive because of the tea and it offers other benefits, including acting as a weed killer, unblocking slow and smelly drains, and speeding up slow compost piles. You can even add bokashi tea to septic systems to help break down waste and prevent odors.
Drawbacks of Bokashi Composting
As beneficial as making bokashi compost is, it also has its drawbacks. Unless handled properly, it can create a foul odor as the materials ferment. You can minimize the smell around your home by using an airtight container—or composting outdoors—but there might not be any avoiding it once you open up the bin.
Bokashi is also designed mainly for food waste. Because a bokashi bucket or bin is quite small, there’s almost no space for yard waste like lawn trimmings and leaves. Additionally, because bokashi is not typical composting but rather fermentation, it doesn’t break down paper products the same way that composting does, so your cardboard, paper food packaging, and other paper products are wasted on bokashi. You might consider having two bins, with a separate compost pile for yard waste and paper products.
What to Add to a Bokashi Composting Bin
With bokashi composting, the materials you can compost are mostly the same as with other types of composting, with a few differences:
- Hair and fur
- Coffee grounds and filters
- Eggshells
- Sawdust
- Wood chips
- Food scraps
- Green or dried leaves
- Kitchen scraps and food waste
- Meat
- Cheese
One thing you must include in bokashi is the fermenting substance, the inoculant, which usually includes wheat bran. Bokashi bran contains effective microorganisms and other materials that help with the fermentation process. You can purchase premium bokashi bran online or even make your own.
One major convenience of a bokashi compost pile is that you can compost meat products and cheese, which you can’t do with other composting systems.
What not to add
There are multiple materials to keep out of bokashi bins to make sure they’re as healthy as possible.
Inorganic matter
Inorganic matter refers to anything that isn’t directly made from living organisms and includes the following items:
- Plastic
- Metal
- Glass
- Aluminum foil
- Synthetic fabrics
- Rubber
These all take longer to break down (centuries, in some cases) and come with environmental implications. They also don’t add many benefits to your bokashi system, as they lack carbon.
Certain biowaste
Organic material generally creates healthy and usable compost, but there are several things you’ll need to keep out. Diseased plants, as well as those riddled with insects, must be left out. Since these don’t ferment, they’ll spread across anything the material is then spread to.
Even though bokashi bins are too small to add most yard waste, you should still know to avoid anything from the black walnut tree, which excretes toxins that can be found in the leaves, bark, roots, and trimmings from the tree. The toxins won’t break down and will make their way to whatever you apply the bokashi to, killing the plants and flowers growing from it.
Other items
You should also avoid adding the following items to your bokashi bin:
- Colored or glossy paper
- Coal or charcoal ash
- Liquid
- Meat bones
- Excessively moldy food
While you can technically add paper items to your bokashi, it doesn’t break down as it would in a conventional compost bin, so it might be pointless to take up space with paper items.
Bokashi Composting vs Traditional Composting
The practicalities of bokashi composting are the most notable ways that it differs from traditional composting systems. It takes up less space, for example, making it more sensible for indoor use and small homes.
The materials that you can and cannot compost also differ, from adding meat and cheese to leaving out paper products.
While it uses many of the same materials to make the end product, the inclusion of bokashi bran sets it apart. Traditional composting breaks down organic material through physical and chemical decomposition, whereas bokashi uses fermentation, a completely different chemical process.
Bokashi is relatively similar in some ways to vermicomposting, which involves adding red wiggler worms to make a worm bin, since you can do it indoors and in small spaces. However, vermicomposting is a form of aerobic decomposition, and bokashi composting isn’t aerobic, or even decomposition, for that matter.
You simply need to add food scraps and bokashi bran to your compost heap and let the fermentation process take place. Bokashi living provides all the benefits of composting without as much effort as the other methods.
How to Start Bokashi Composting at Home
Home composting with the bokashi method is simpler than many other types of composting, thanks to the relatively little effort involved in it. Here’s the step-by-step process:
- Buy bokashi bran and a bin (or airtight container to add materials to).
- Prepare your bin and place it somewhere out of direct sunlight.
- Chop up your kitchen scraps to let them ferment faster.
- Add scraps and bran to the bin, and push out the air.
- Once full, leave to ferment.
- Drain the compost tea every two or three days (this can be added to soil as the rest of the material breaks down).
What Is Bokashi Composting: Wrapping Up
A quick, easy, and environmentally friendly way to dispose of food waste, bokashi composting is an effective option for eco-minded apartment dwellers and small home owners. You’ll not only help the environment but also take care of your garden and reduce the amount of food you need to throw out.
FAQs
How long does bokashi take to compost?
The speed of bokashi composting is one of the main benefits compared to alternatives. While other options take months to compost materials, a bokashi system does so in as little as a few weeks.
What is a bokashi composting system?
A bokashi system is a bin designed to let you take full advantage of bokashi composting. It’s specifically designed to speed up the process and make sure no foul odor or smell makes its way out of the system during the process. It also keeps pests and other unwanted critters away from your yard waste and other materials as they ferment.
Is bokashi better than composting?
Whether bokashi is better than any other form of composting depends on your perspective. It takes up less space and can be a more effective option for apartments or small homes. You might not be able to compost as many materials as with other options, however. The speed of the process makes up for this.
How does bokashi composting work?
Bokashi composting works by encouraging beneficial organisms to thrive in a bokashi bucket. The bran and molasses in bokashi bran feed beneficial microbes, with these then breaking down the organic matter added to the bokashi bin in an anaerobic process that doesn’t need oxygen.
The bokashi method breaks down food scraps, dairy products, and other organic matter, turning the fermented material into bokashi compost. It saves space compared to traditional compost methods and has the same benefits and uses as regular compost.